Chapter 22

After his morning practice and a brief chat with Tom, Roger arrived in his home room classroom as the morning announcements were being broadcast.

“ ... As usual, your home room teachers have the list of students selected as participants for the Program this week. We ask those whose names are announced to drop off their bags or backpacks in your lockers and come to the conference room. Thank you for your cooperation. Have a good morning.”

The teacher read off four names and looked up; the four kids who had been named remained seated, stony-faced.

“You’re not cooperating?” the teacher said to no one in particular.

There was a mixture of head-shaking and “no” from the four.

“All right,” the teacher sighed. “Carry on...”

“Oh,” Ayame whispered. “Maybe no one will do it now.”

“Hope so,” Cynthia agreed.

On their way to their first class, they didn’t encounter anyone participating, and in Anatomy, the teacher had three students on his list; all were clothed. He challenged them. Two were 18 years old.

“I can’t be forced to participate against my will,” one student responded, “I’m an adult.”

The other agreed, and the third student said she was from a military family and wouldn’t participate.

After class, Cynthia went to those three students who had stopped to briefly talk to each other and asked if they had gone to that infamous conference room at all; none had. Then they parted ways with Ayame and went to Econ.

After that class, Ayame rushed to find the twins before gym began.

“Michelle got picked!” she panted as she ran up to the twins.

“Oh!” Cynthia exclaimed. “Is she doing it?”

“No! She is refusing and said Cirota-san came to her first class to find her, too.”

“And...?”

“She said she would not speak to him. He speak and she looked away, she said. Teacher told her she should go into hall to talk and not interrupt class and she told teacher she was staying in class, that she wasn’t talking, Cirota was one who talked.”

“Ha!” Roger laughed. “Smart girl.”

“Yes. So teacher told Cirota to go out.”

“Did you have any naked kids in the class, Ayame?” Cynthia asked.

“None.”

Roger went off to the pool then and the others went to gym. When they dressed and appeared in the gym, they didn’t see any naked students there, either. Their activity was stretches and medicine-ball work and Mary was in their group.

“Happy your week is done?” Cynthia asked her.

“Hell, yeah. But guess what I heard? I came to my gym locker early today to get something and I overheard Cirota talking to some gym teachers. He’s loud, you know, so I heard him but couldn’t hear the answers too good. He was trying to get the teachers to agree to make all the gym classes naked, he said other Program schools do that and he wants this one to do it too.”

Ayame blanched.

“What?” Cynthia exclaimed. “They can’t do that! I mean, the teachers just can’t do that on their own, I don’t think.”

“Well, I guess, because I did hear a teacher raise her voice and say something and then ‘ ... not happening here. Forget it.’”

“Crazy stuff...” Cynthia mused. “What will they think of next?”

“Yeah,” Mary continued, “I heard that at some schools they have naked cheerleaders and they do have naked gym too. One school I know of definitely. I have a cousin who graduated from one in Massachusetts last year and they had started doing that at his school.”

“Damn. But that must be up to the school, not a Program requirement.”

“Yeah. He did say that. So some parents objected and since it wasn’t a Program rule, a lot of kids got out of being in gym while he was there, anyway. They were put in a special group or something.”

“Unbelievable. I’m sure that won’t happen here, especially since the Program is collapsing too. Did you see any naked kids this morning?”

“No, not in the halls either. One kid was called in my home room but it looked like he was absent today,” Mary replied.

The teacher had come over and was glaring at them, then told them to stop chatting and buckle down.

During lunch, the twins learned some more details about the morning’s participation results. They had arrived a little after the rush and went through the line later than usual; when they found a table, they noticed that there was a knot of kids around a girl listening to her talking; then the group began to disperse and they overheard comments like, “Wow,” “Cool,” “No shit,” and similar exclamations. Two of the kids the twins knew sat down at the other end of their table and greeted them.

“So what was that about?” Roger asked.

“Oh, you didn’t hear her? Well, she’s an office aide and was running an errand during home room. She passed the conference room about five minutes after the Program announcement. She said she was curious to see who was there, no one was yet, so she waited and only three kids came to the room after maybe another five minutes. She said two went in but the third said something like ‘If it’s gonna be only a couple of kids, no way am I doing it,’ and he went away.

“She told us that on her way back past the room she heard a girl inside shouting that she wasn’t going to be the only one in the whole school and then she rushed out. So it looks like nobody’s in the Program this week. Cool, huh?”

“Yeah, really. Looks like everyone was encouraged to refuse by hearing Davis on the PA on Friday,” Cynthia commented.

“For sure. I know that if I’m called, no way will I do it either,” their tablemate stated.

In Psychology there were two non-participants; Mason called their names and they told her that they weren’t participating, so the class began normally.

After class, as they passed the front doors, there were no clothing boxes set out there and there were no kids hanging around to watch people getting dressed. The twins looked at each other, grinned, and did a fist-bump.

Tom came out of the building then and looked around, smiling as he realized that there were no clothing boxes. He greeted Cynthia with a kiss and they went off together, while Ayame and Roger left them to go home. Cynthia came home after dinner and Tom stopped in to say hello to her parents; they chatted for a while and then he left.

“So have you kids decided on your nudist vacation yet?” Sarah asked before Cynthia, Roger, and Ayame went to do their homework.

“I think I have, Mom,” Roger answered. “I’m gonna try it ‘cause Ayame said she’d go too.”

“Yeah, same here,” Cynthia said. “I figured that if I can’t go through with shedding the clothes, I can stay dressed, and Tom said no one would care. He told me that maybe I’d get teased at first, but then no one would say a word after that.”

“Well, I had mentioned to you that your dad and I are friends with a couple who are nudists,” Sarah told them. “I saw my friend today in the market and she said that if you go, you’d have a great time. She said she knows Tom’s folks and she plans to be at their resort on spring break too and to look for her if you go. It’s Marsha and Warren Peters, you know them, right?”

“Sure. Wow, didn’t know that about them.”

“Yeah,” Sarah said, “she said nudists don’t advertise that they are to everyone.” She laughed. “Marsha asked me if we wanted to go, too, make it a family outing...”

“Eeeuwww,” Cynthia exclaimed, “Mom! You wouldn’t!”

“And why not?” Sarah grinned. “What’s wrong if we went too? ... No, don’t worry; this isn’t our style, kids. We’re just as happy with our clothes on, okay?”

“Yeah,” Denison grinned. “It’s definitely not on my bucket list, but if you kids want to try it, well, you gotta make up your own minds about things that you enjoy. But you know not to make a big deal about it, right? We’re still in a pretty conservative military establishment here.”

“Sure, Dad,” Roger said.

They left for their rooms to do their work. While Roger was working, he got a text from Sam. It said that Ellen would be in touch with him soon about her Central High School contacts. After he finished his work, he and Ayame spent the rest of the evening together just chatting and being close.

The following day, Tuesday, turned out to be an absolutely normal school day with no drama or any unexpected events. At practice, Roger told Tom about their deciding to go to the resort and Tom was delighted to hear that, saying that he’d let his dad know so that he could make the reservations.

At home that afternoon, however, the twins’ mom had some interesting news.

“Say,” she said, “you’ll be interested in this letter from your school,” handing Cynthia the document when the kids got home.

Cynthia began to read out loud.

Dear Parents:

This letter is being sent to all parents and guardians of students who have not yet participated in the Naked in School Program. As a result of unplanned circumstances, our methods of selecting participants for each week needs to be modified to allow the Program to operate in the manner mandated by the federal government’s rules. To assist us, we would be grateful for your cooperation. Many parents have allowed their students to refuse to participate in the Program and that is interfering with the school’s ability to assure that students receive the educational, psychological, and social benefits that the Program provides.

We understand that many of you believe that you have the right to refuse to allow your child to participate and we of the school administration assure you that you do not have the right to dictate which of the school’s curriculum modules in which your child must participate. However, we realize that this is a very sensitive and volatile issue among many parents, so we would like to assess the level of future compliance the school may expect from your family if your student is selected to participate.

Please complete the attached form and return it to the school using the enclosed reply envelope. And we would appreciate your returning it by Friday. Many thanks for your cooperation.

Sincerely,
Mr George Davis
Principal

“And the form asks whether the parent or guardian agrees to allow their student to participate, and this is interesting, whether the student, if he or she’s picked, will agree to participate. Wow,” Cynthia finished.

“Wow indeed,” Roger said. “Looks like they’re trying to keep from having weeks with zero kids participating, like this one, by finding some kids who’ll get naked.”

“So your kids’ resistance movement is working?” Sarah asked.

“Oh, yeah, big time,” Cynthia enthused. “No one’s naked this week at all.”

“Good for you!” Sarah responded. “And no consequences yet?”

“So far none, but we’ll see what happens come graduation. They threatened that if kids refused, they wouldn’t graduate.”

Roger grinned, “Say, there’s a cool thought ... look, in the time left before school ends, they can only select a little more than half of the seniors to do the Program. Except for Tom and a couple of others, I think hardly any seniors’ve done the Program. So if most of the remaining seniors don’t participate, and if they don’t allow them to go to graduation, maybe only half of the senior class’ll be there.”

“Right,” Cynthia agreed. She laughed. “So maybe we should have our own private ceremony...”

“Hey, hold that thought,” Sarah said. “Mention it to Dad this evening, okay? So how should Dad and I answer the letter?” she laughed. “Any doubts about what we’ll say?”

“None at all, Mom,” Roger grinned.

“Yeah, not at all and our birthday is in less than two weeks, too. Then we could refuse as adults,” Cynthia commented.

Later, when the family was eating dinner, Cynthia mentioned her comment about the possibility of half of the senior class not being able to attend the graduation ceremony because they had refused to do the Program. Her dad grinned at her.

“Yeah. You’re not the first one to think of that happening, kid. For a change, you got beat on an idea. Col Masterson mentioned that his daughter was unhappy about possibly not having a graduation ceremony to attend, so he did some checking and found out that the school prepares a list and releases it on the third week of April, of all the students who will be eligible to walk at graduation. That’s when we’ll know if they are going to exclude the kids who didn’t do the Program. If they’re to be excluded, the colonel said he’d set up an alternate ceremony at the base and invite the entire senior class to do it here, and do it real big—you know how we Marines love to do big ceremonies,” he laughed.

“Neat!” both twins chorused.

Ayame wore a curious expression. “What is ‘walk at graduation’?” she asked.

“It means to take part in a graduation, like to walk across the stage and shake hands and get the diploma,” Roger replied. “But they don’t give you the diploma then; they mail it out later. You just get a folder case to keep it in,” he explained. “So yeah, the graduation wouldn’t have to be done at the school ... Wow, I like that idea.”

Somewhat later, Roger and Ayame were watching TV and Cynthia was working on her computer, when Roger’s phone signaled a text message. He picked it up and read it.

“Oh, good,” he told Ayame. “It’s from Ellen. Let’s tell Cindy this.”

They went to her room.

“Cindy, got a text from Ellen. She said her friend at Central can talk now and she’s on video IM now with her. Here’s her alias. Let’s see if we can get her.”

Cynthia pinged the alias and the reply asked her to try again in ten minutes. Ten minutes later they were in contact.

“Hey, is that Cindy?” the teen on the monitor screen asked.

“Yeah; let me adjust the webcam so you can see my brother and cousin,” Cynthia answered. “That’s Roger and Ayame.”

“Hey, I see you all now. Hi, I’m Roberta. Ellen was in my school in my freshman and part of sophomore year. She told me you’re looking for info on the Program in other schools.”

“That’s right. It just came to our school and there’s nothing on the web about other people’s Program experiences,” Cynthia answered.

“Yeah, I know. Central was the first school to have it so we kids were blind-sided. One of our graduates is famous, though. She’s become a spokesman for the Program—Karen Wagner, ever hear of her?”

“Shit, yeah,” Cynthia responded. “She was in a porno video they showed at our school last week as a Program intro, so we saw her and a guy doing everything—a BJ, cunt-licking, even fucking.”

“Hell, if that’s all the video showed her doing, that’s tame compared to everything she did. She gave a speech when she finished her Program week and said she fucked maybe twenty boys and did anal sex with a bunch too during her week. Hey, she wrote up a journal of her time in the Program, too—it’s on a website called “Naked In School Collection”—if the feds haven’t shut that down—but in her account she didn’t say anything about the boys who were also naked that week. There were a few who were. Shit, Karen wrote in her journal that she did all kinds of perverted junk and was proud of it!”

“Oh, wow. Ellen told us that in her classes they had bondage and sadism stuff too.”

“Shit, yeah, but that got stopped. We had a weird biology teacher who loved to teach her classes nude and she demonstrated bondage and S&M toys and used them on the kids too. Lots of times she made kids who weren’t even on the Program strip in class and do kinky stuff with each other. I was in her class as a soph but I told her right up front that I wouldn’t do any of that crap. I guess because I’m a big girl—I’m 6 feet tall and weigh about 180 pounds and play goalie in my girls’ hockey league here—that she wasn’t interested in making me into a spectacle, so I got out of doing any shit. Besides, if she tried something, I could crush her. Anyway, she’s not here anymore. The federal Program office hired her.”